Did the dialogue fail?

Dmitry Dubrovsky , Associate Professor, National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow), scientific. co-workers CISR (St. Petersburg) commented for TrV-Nauka on the situation with amendments to several fundamental documents of the Higher School of Economics, which caused great discussions and controversy.

The draft amendments to the Internal Regulations of Students, the Internal Labor Regulations, as well as the procedure for supporting student initiatives at NRU-HSE were caused, as is now quite obvious, by several crises that have rocked the university recently.

This, of course, is the case of Hasan Guseinov, the case of Yegor Zhukov and the exclusion of the student magazine DOXA from the number of student organizations of the National Research University Higher School of Economics. All these cases have one thing in common: the official position of the university leadership, which considered critical statements of various contents (from criticism of the state of the Russian language to corruption in the Russian State University of Social Sciences) not only “violating university ethics,” but also “threatening the political neutrality of the university.”

In connection with this, the main provision included in both documents was the obligation of students and teachers to “exclude affiliation with the university in the event of participation in political or other activities that cause significant disagreement in society”; an exception was made for the “expert and analytical position”. At the same time, the amendments also contain a requirement “not to commit actions that damage the business reputation of the university, its employees and students.”

The logic of these amendments seems to be somewhat at odds with the conviction expressed back in 2013 by Rector Yaroslav Kuzminov [ 1 ]: “at HSE there are representatives of different political views... but they are engaged in actual political activities outside the walls of the university.” Apparently, the position of the leadership changed in connection with precisely those events that have already been mentioned.

True, the leadership of the National Research University Higher School of Economics insists that such amendments are not a violation of academic freedom and an act of censorship and that, in general, the same provisions exist in a number of universities in democratic countries, in particular in the USA. In the same way, did not find the newly appointed head of the Human Rights Council, Valery Fadeev, any violations of freedom of speech in the amendments [ 2 ].

Criticism of these amendments, most fully presented in the Conclusion of the trade union “University Solidarity” [ 3 ], draws attention not only to the fact that the requirement to speak out on socially important issues in the manner established by the HSE administration violates the basic principle of academic freedom of speech and impedes the work of independent trade unions.

At the same time, these amendments, according to University Solidarity lawyers, “demonstrate a high level of legal uncertainty,” since it is completely unclear how to understand which issues “are of significant disagreement,” and how to determine whether the employee is in the right position “ analytical or expert position” in order to speak out on them.

At the same time, it is highly questionable who and how will determine damage to the “business reputation of the University,” since the Commission on Scientific Ethics has already demonstrated exactly how it understands academic ethics and damage to business reputation.

Note that the decision of this commission has already been assessed by the Committee on Academic Freedom of the Association of Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies (ASEEES), which expressed in its letter to Rector Kuzminov its concern about the pressure exerted by the Commission on Academic Ethics of the Academic Council of the Higher School of Economics in Moscow against Professor Hasan Huseynov and assessed the Commission’s demand as “a direct infringement of his academic freedom as a teacher and researcher” [ 4 ]. Please note that the Commission did not receive a response to this letter.

According to Pavel Kudyukin, co-chairman of University Solidarity, “as a result of a serious public campaign, the leadership of the National Research University Higher School of Economics has significantly softened the initial set of restrictions.” According to the rules that have come into force, it is possible to speak without permission, and in such speeches “on controversial issues” one must either refrain from affiliation with the university, or place a notice that the position is solely a personal position and does not purport to express the position of the Higher School of Economics.

It appears that the actually introduced amendment does not change anything in the position of teachers and students, but it seems that the level of trust and agreement within the university has been undermined by this strange campaign. First of all, because more than 5,000 signatories of the protest against the amendments were branded as outcasts, and those criticizing the amendments were asked to think about moving to “non-state universities.” Vice-Rector Valeria Kasamara explains it this way: “if you have chosen a state university under the government of the Russian Federation, then you must be aware that there is a founder who determines the goal and objectives” [ 5 ].

Thus, despite the fact that formally the rules regarding speech have not actually changed, it appears that the “founder’s policy” has changed. This circumstance caused such a sharp reaction, caused, as it seems, by a sharp discrepancy between the formal statements in the desire to “preserve the freedom of the university and prevent censorship” with the initially proposed strict permitting rules.

The main consequence of the development of this crisis, it seems, is that, as DOXA editor Armen Aramyan said , “we did not have a dialogue” [ 6 ]. And the absence of this dialogue between some of the professors, students and management has, in my opinion, long-term negative consequences for the development of the Higher School of Economics.

Dmitry Dubrovsky

Photo: philologist.livejournal.com